


Gravestones

by crystalkei



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-04 23:15:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3096182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystalkei/pseuds/crystalkei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bellamy's projects to take care of the dead they've lost make Clarke uncomfortable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gravestones

Clarke came out of medical shaking excess water from her hands. If she’d been paying attention she wouldn’t have run into the back of Bellamy, but well, she wasn’t paying attention.   
  
“So, boy or girl?” Bellamy asked without turning around. She smoothed out his jacket at the shoulders and side stepped to stand next to him.

“Boy, six pounds.”  
  
“Congrats to the first baby of the new year,” he raised a glass and some people in the group a few feet in front of them raised their glasses and cheered. He turned back to her.   
  
“They’re so slimy, newborns I mean,” he said with an upturned nose. She smiled at him. Sometimes she forgot that he’d helped deliver Octavia.

“Kinda look like potatoes,” Clarke said. “But now I’ve helped deliver one so I’m fully prepped for anything, right?”

He made a face and swung back and forth looking for something, he put his fist out to a wooden post two steps away and knocked on it.   
  
“What are you trying to do? Jinx everything? Tomorrow you’re going to have to perform open heart surgery out there in the woods now, when it happens, I will remind you it’s because you said you were ready for anything.”   
  
Clarke sighed. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Here,” he said with a laugh, handing her a glass. She sniffed it and took a swig. It burned. Not the best batch but she wasn’t going back for more. “Tomorrow, I’m going to go out to the drop ship, you want to come?”

“You hoped the alcohol would convince me?” she joked and he shrugged. “I think it’s great that you’re going, but I’m not into digging up those feelings.”

“No big deal, just wanted to offer.” Clarke looked at him, he was being honest, she liked that she knew that. They’d come a long way from hating each other when they set foot on the ground. 

“Say hi to Wells for me,” she added before giving him back the cup and heading to bed.   
  
“I never forget,” he threw over his shoulder as she walked away. “I’ll come as soon as I know these idiots are safely tucked in bed.” She waved an arm letting him know she heard him.

 

—-

   
  
The number of times Bellamy was right about shit like this was staggering. Clarke should have known. She should have knocked on wood like he did.  
  
A hunting party had gone out and a woman named Tempest had been bit by one of those leathery looking jaguars. It had clamped down on her thigh and she was bleeding everywhere. They’d radioed ahead saying they couldn’t bring her in, what they needed was for someone to come to them, Clarke knew where they were so she went running before her mother could stop her. A new medic trailed behind her. She worked for an hour and cleaned up what she could, getting Tempest well enough to be moved back to camp. The medic and the rest of the hunting team started back but when Clarke saw where they were, how close they were to the drop ship, she sent the others back to Camp Jaha. Today seemed like as good as any to face it and she knew Bellamy was still there.

She found him sitting on a log, his shirt was soaked through with sweat, he looked tired, dirty, and very sexy but she didn’t think that was appropriate at the moment. Bellamy looked up when she came through the trees. He smiled. 

“Fancy meeting you here,” he said but then his brow lowered. “You okay?” He gestured to her blood stained clothes. Clarke looked down at her shirt and waved him off.   
  
“I’m fine, just work stuff. And the patient is fine, too,” she added before he worried about someone else.   
  
Clarke took a moment to look around. The drop ship was just behind the outline of what used to be the sturdy wall that kept them mostly safe in those first weeks on Earth. The foliage was starting to reclaim the wall, vines and things making their way around it. Where they were standing though, this was where the bodies were buried. Literally. Bellamy had taken it upon himself to put in solid grave markers. Today he was working on a fence around the area. He’d been using large rocks, the size of melons, stacking them up. It was about a third of the way done. She figured once he finished that though, he’d figure out some other project for the area to punish himself with.  
  
He carried the weight of these deaths more than she ever would. But she was the one who couldn’t bring herself to face the spot. She hated it here. It even smelled bad to her.   
  
“Let’s go home, huh? I think you’ve done enough today,” Clarke suggested hoping to hide the way she was unnerved by her surroundings.   
  
“Alright.” He stood up, grabbed his bag and then tapped each marker as he walked towards her. It was like a prayer the way he took a second to pay attention to each one. She tried to think of all the names, she wasn’t close enough to see the etchings on the markers, she didn’t want to be that close. But it did bother her that she couldn’t remember the names. Bellamy knew them all.   
  
“See any ghosts today?” she asked as he finally made it to her and they started to walk.   
  
“Only yours,” he teased. “It’s surreal to see you here, now, after all this time.”

“Don’t be a dick,” she said shoving into him with her side so he was thrown off balance a little. He grabbed her wrist to steady himself. 

“I know, I know, you don’t like to look back at the past, I’m sorry,” he offered, moving his fingers down to lace with hers.

“It’s good that you take care of them like this, but I just can’t.” He nodded in response and squeezed her hand.   
  
“You take care of the living,” Bellamy said. “I got the other part.”

—-  
  
As they lay in bed that night, Clarke tried again to run over all the names. There were 52 but only about 20 buried there at the drop ship. The others long lost to the explosion. She tossed and turned causing Bellamy to stir.   
  
“What’s’matter?” his words all jumbled together as he came out of the heavy fog of sleep.   
  
“Go back to sleep,” she whispered.   
  
“I’m up now, you’re like an octopus tonight, I’ve slept with two girls at once that moved less than you.” This remark was met with an arm to his chest that produced an “oof” from him.

“Jackass,” she mumbled. 

“Afraid you’re going to see ghosts?” he prodded.   
  
“Maybe.” She kicked off the blanket and sat up. He rolled onto his side, head propped on his hand and his other hand rubbed her back. “I don’t need any of your inspirational slaying demons while you’re awake bullshit, okay?”

“Wasn’t gonna say anything.” Clarke instantly felt bad for her words. Taking out her frustration on him wasn’t going to help and he certainly didn’t deserve it.   
  
“I can’t remember all their names and I can’t stand on that ground without being uncomfortable… I push all of them away.”  
  
“That’s how you deal with it,” he said easily. “If that’s what you have to do to function, to keep living, there’s nothing wrong with it.”   
  
Clarke took a deep breath, trying to accept those words. He did things better than her, I mean sure he couldn’t stitch anyone up, but he could forgive her sins and fix everyone’s other problems.   
  
“Dig around in that drawer, the bottom one,” Bellamy told her, never taking his hand off her back. She leaned over and rummaged through the bits of small paper they’d collected. “On the side there, it’s folded, see it?”  
  
Pulling out the paper that had been folded a few times, Clarke smoothed it out and reached for the lamp. It was a list of names. She didn’t recognize the first two, but the third was Wells, then a few more, and she knew this was a list he’d kept of all the dead.

“I had to ask around a little bit, I mean I did that when I was making the stones, and then I got Sinclair to give me the roster of all the hundred, I marked off where I could, put the dates together.” She turned to him and saw his face, a mix of sadness and pride at the work he’d done to collect the list. She hugged him close and kissed the skin where her mouth met his shoulder. His arms held her tight and they stayed like that for a moment until she pulled away.

 “Your mother would be so proud of you,” she said and he smiled a little. 

“She’s gone. I don’t worry about her much anymore, I worry about the people who are here now.”

“Well,  _I’m_  proud of you,” Clarke replied. “And the parents that made it down are glad you did this thing, I know they are.” 

After a moment she nestled into his side and held the list close, reading over the names.   
  
“Better?” he asked. She nodded and continued reading the list over and over. “Good, I’m beat and I’ve got a lot of shit to do tomorrow.” It was only a few minutes before his lazy hand running through her hair stopped and he was breathing steady and deep.   
  
Clarke read over the names a few more times, trying to commit them to memory before folding the list back and stuffing it under her pillow. She didn’t like to look back or dwell on that time, but she wanted to pay the proper respect, she’d memorize those names. If she couldn’t stand on that ground, she’d at least remember the names. 


End file.
